luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · October 8, 2025

No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.

Bruins at Capitals, Oct 8, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Bruins beat the Capitals 3–1, but the replays lean toward the Capitals: they take 7 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 46 points of win probability to the Bruins.

The game turned on a luck play (P2, 7:53 left): David Pastrnak scored on a snap shot from 58 feet, worth 22 points of win probability to the Bruins. The biggest single swing (P3, 12:19 left): Elias Lindholm scored on a backhand shot from 9 feet.

Final

Boston Bruins 3
Washington Capitals 1

October 8, 2025 · Capital One Arena

Luck index +73 Bruins very lucky · −73 Capitals

Each team’s own shots from this game, resampled into new games 4,000 times, each a goal at its chance, with the power plays the penalties gave and the pulled goalie at the end: with the way both teams actually played, how often does this performance win? How the replay works

Ten replays. Bruins win 3, Capitals win 7.

  1. 1 BOS 4 WSH 1
  2. 2 BOS 2 WSH 1
  3. 3 BOS 3 WSH 2
  4. 4 BOS 1 WSH 2
  5. 5 BOS 0 WSH 1
  6. 6 BOS 1 WSH 3
  7. 7 BOS 1 WSH 4
  8. 8 BOS 0 WSH 3
  9. 9 BOS 1 WSH 5
  10. 10 BOS 1 WSH 7

Three other ways to ask

Each answers a different question, so none of them replaces the replay above.

No closing line for this game.

Needs the closing line, which this game has not got.

Every shot redrawn at its chance, overtime and the shootout replayed as near coin flips; the shots themselves and every call fixed. The narrowest view of luck.

How 4,000.1 replays ended

Bruins win 27% of them, Capitals 73%. The line is what actually happened: Bruins by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Bruins by 3+4.8%
Bruins by 25.4%
Bruins by 117.0%
Capitals by 118.6%
Capitals by 213.1%
Capitals by 3+41.1%

Where the luck was

What the luck was worth

Every lucky and unlucky play, weighted by the moment it happened: its swing in win probability, added up by kind. A post hit in a blowout counts for nothing; the same post with a minute left in a tie game can be most of a win.

Swings add up across a game, so in one that went back and forth they can pass 100%. On the scoreboard the same luck was worth +2.8 goals to the Bruins: the final margin was Bruins by 2, without the luck Capitals by 0.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Bruins4221.71+0.29
Capitals5514.03−3.03

Regulation with both goalies in. Expected goals: our model of each shot’s chance from where and how it was taken (distance, angle, shot type, rebound, rush, strength), adjusted for the shooter’s and the goalie’s records. A team above expected finished better or met a weaker night in goal; 75% of the gap counts as luck (why that share).

Calls

Every penalty that put a team on the power play, and every goal taken off the board on review, with what it did to the helped team’s chance of winning at that moment. Calls don’t count toward luck by default: who draws penalties repeats from game to game like a skill (how calls are valued). Switch them on below.

WhenCallWin probability for
P1 18:09 Hooking on the Bruins (David Pastrnak): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P1 13:14 Interference on the Capitals (Trevor van Riemsdyk): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BOS
P1 6:54 Interference on the Bruins (Sean Kuraly): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P1 0:47 Cross checking on the Bruins (Henri Jokiharju): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P2 19:41 Tripping on the Bruins (Charlie McAvoy): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P2 7:18 Tripping on the Bruins (Mark Kastelic): 2 minutes on the power play +5% WSH
P3 12:42 Holding on the Capitals (John Carlson): 2 minutes on the power play +7% BOS

When it happened

Capitals’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 54%. Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.

Our in-game win probability: the score and the time left, starting from the betting line (or the home edge alone when there is none), with goals at the league’s rates for the score. Overtime is drawn at a fixed width. Shaded above the middle while the Capitals were ahead in it, below while the Bruins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P2 7:53 The game turned hereDavid Pastrnak scored on a snap shot from 58 feetShooting · 2% chance +22% BOS –
2 P2 7:18 Tripping on the Bruins (Mark Kastelic): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% WSH –
3 P2 4:40 Martin Fehérváry’s snap shot from 10 feet was savedShooting · 21% chance +5% BOS –
4 P3 12:57 Tom Wilson scored on a snap shot from 21 feetShooting · 15% chance +25% WSH –
5 P3 12:42 Holding on the Capitals (John Carlson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +7% BOS –
6 P3 12:19 Elias Lindholm scored on a backhand shot from 9 feetShooting · 13% chance +27% BOS –
7 P3 1:18 Tom Wilson missed the net with a snap shot from 22 feetShooting · 19% chance +8% BOS –
8 P3 1:16 Jakob Chychrun’s snap shot from 29 feet was savedShooting · 11% chance +5% BOS –

Adjust the assumptions

Think finishing is more skill than we do, or that the calls were luck? Change it and the coin-flip replay reruns in your browser.

Only coin-flips re-rolled

Bruins 37% · Capitals 63%

Final margin
Bruins by 2
Luck in goals
2.8 for the Bruins
Luck-adjusted margin
Capitals by 0.8
Replay with same day's form
Bruins 27% · Capitals 73% unchanged: why
How much of each is luck?

0% treats it as skill, 100% as pure luck. The tick is our fit.

What counts
Flip a play

Force the other outcome, in this game and in every replay: a goal becomes a save, a post goes in, a penalty goes the other way.

About these numbers

Play-by-play from the NHL via fastRhockey; expected goals, in-game win probability and the replays are our own models, fitted on every game since 2018-19 (methodology and validation). Blocked shots aren’t replayed (their location is the block’s, not the shot’s). No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.

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